Fanny Corbaux

Marie Françoise Catherine Doetger "Fanny" Corbaux (1812–1883) was a British painter and biblical commentator. She was also the inventor of kalsomine (calcimine), whitewash with added zinc oxide.

Life Corbaux was born in Paris, the daughter of Francis Corbaux, an English-born statistician and mathematician, the author of the Dictionnaire des Arbitrages des Changes, and the Doctrine of Compound Interest, She quickly developed her talents, and in 1827 she was awarded the large silver medal of the Society of Arts for an original miniature portrait, the silver Isis medal for a copy of figures in water-colours, and the silver palette for a copy of an engraving. In 1828 an original composition of figures in watercolours again won her the silver Isis medal, and a miniature portrait, exhibited in 1830, the gold medal.

She exhibited 86 works at the Royal Academy between 1829 and 1854, fifteen at the British Institution and 48 at the Society of British Artists.

In 1839 Corbaux took out a patent, jointly with Francis Gybbon Spilsbury and Alexander S. Byrne for what was described as an "improvement in the mode of applying distemper colors, having albumen or gelatin for the vehicle, so as to render the same more durable, and preserving the same when not wanted for immediate use."

Corbaux gained a reputation as a biblical critic for her contributions to periodicals and literary societies on subjects relating to scriptural history. They included her Letters on the Physical Geography of the Exodus, published in the Athenæum, and a series on the Rephaim for the Journal of Sacred Literature. She also wrote a historical and chronological introduction to The Exodus Papyri, by D.I. Heath (1855).